“My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart
and my portion forever.”
—Psalm 73:26
There are days when you do not feel strong. Days when holding it together feels like pretending. Days when your heart buckles under the weight of disappointment, confusion, and spiritual exhaustion. You may be tempted to believe that this means you are weak. Or worse—that God is absent.
But God never asked you to be unbreakable. He asked you to depend. The psalmist Asaph came to this conclusion after envying the wicked. He saw their comfort and questioned the point of his own pursuit of righteousness. “Surely in vain I have kept my heart pure,” he wrote (Psalm 73:13). He nearly stumbled. He nearly gave up. And it was only when he entered the sanctuary of God that he saw clearly again.
Faith is not the absence of frailty. It is the resolve to look to God in your frailty.
Asaph admitted it plainly: “My flesh and my heart may fail.” But that was not the end. God was his strength. God was his portion. God was the part that did not collapse.
Brokenness becomes hope when it drives you to the One who holds what you cannot. God is not waiting for you to prove yourself. He is not impressed with your ability to stand tall through every storm. He is drawn to the humble. He upholds the weary. And He supplies what you no longer have.
There is a kind of sacred strength found only in surrender. When you confess, “I cannot do this,” and God answers, “I never asked you to.”
Cross-References
• “Come to Me, all who are weary and burdened, and I will give you
rest.” —Matthew 11:28
• “He gives strength to the weary, and to the one who lacks might He
increases power.” —Isaiah 40:29
• “We have this treasure in earthen vessels, so that the surpassing
greatness of the power will be of God and not from ourselves.” —2Corinthians 4:7
Reflection Questions:
- Where in your life have you been performing strength instead of admitting collapse?
- What does it mean to you that God never asked you to be unbreakable — only to depend?
- What would it look like to stop carrying your burden today and let God be the strength your heart cannot manufacture?
Suggested Prayer:
*Father, I am done pretending I can carry this—I surrender my striving to You, and I ask for the strength that only comes when I finally stop.*
This devotional is excerpted from Hope for the Broken by D.C. Robertsson.
